Tiivistelmä

ABSTRACT
The number of HIV infections among people born outside Finland or with foreign citizenship has been continuously increasing gradually since the beginning of the epidemic in the 1990s. And in 2011, for the first time, more non-Finnish than Finnish persons have been diagnosed with HIV. This high trend in foreigner HIV diagnosis calls for a better handling and screening of foreign individuals. Also, it's important to address the post-diagnosis treatment and support that include psychosocial and peer support.
The reason for the research come from phenomena noticed while doing the placement in positiiviset ry , a peer support facilitator association, which is the lack of participation in support group among HIV-positive immigrants .
A qualitative research was done by doing an interview with 8 HIV positive immigrants in the period of 2 weeks in march 2015.

This paper discusses the difficulties of being an HIV-positive immigrant and the reasons for the lack of participation in support group programs designed to address the needs of HIV-positive clients. We see the point-of-view of the HIV-positive immigrants on why the lack of participation. It also discuses the possible measures that could be taken to tackle this problem
The outcome of the study states that there is a lack of knowledge about the service , cultural difference , language barrier and a need for foreign peer facilitator .